A Dynamic Trajectory Fit to Multi-Sensor Fireball Observations

Meteorites with known orbital origins are key to our understanding of Solar System formation and the source of life on Earth. However, these pristine samples of space material are incredibly rare. Less than 40 of the 60,000 meteorites held in collections around the world have known dynamical origins...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:arXiv.org 2019-11
Main Authors: Jansen-Sturgeon, Trent, Sansom, Eleanor K, Devillepoix, Hadrien A R, Bland, Philip A, Towner, Martin C, Howie, Robert M, Hartig, Benjamin A D
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Ablation
Computer simulation
Equations of motion
Fireballs
Fragmentation
Least squares method
Line of sight
Meteorites
Meteoroids
Meteors & meteorites
Monte Carlo simulation
Observatories
Offsets
Origins
Sensors
Solar system evolution
Three dimensional motion
Trajectory analysis
Triangulation
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Summary:Meteorites with known orbital origins are key to our understanding of Solar System formation and the source of life on Earth. However, these pristine samples of space material are incredibly rare. Less than 40 of the 60,000 meteorites held in collections around the world have known dynamical origins. Fireball networks have been developed globally in a unified effort to increase this number by using multiple observatories to record, triangulate, and dynamically analyse ablating meteoroids as they enter our atmosphere. The accuracy of the chosen meteoroid triangulation method directly influences the accuracy of the determined orbit and the likelihood of possible meteorite recovery. There are three leading techniques for meteoroid triangulation discussed in the literature: the Method of Planes, the Straight Line Least Squares method, and the Multi-Parameter Fit method. Here we describe an alternative method to meteoroid triangulation, called the Dynamic Trajectory Fit. This approach uses the meteoroid's 3D dynamic equations of motion to fit a realistic trajectory directly to multi-sensor line-of-sight observations. This method has the ability to resolve fragmentation events, fit systematic observatory timing offsets, and determine mass estimates of the meteoroid along its observable trajectory. Through a comprehensive Monte-Carlo analysis of over 100,000 trajectory simulations, we find this new method to more accurately estimate meteoroid trajectories of slow entry events (\(
ISSN:2331-8422
DOI:10.48550/arxiv.1911.00816